Have you gone to a hot spot today?

NETWORK WORLD NEWSLETTER: KEITH SHAW ON WIRELESS COMPUTING
DEVICES
06/21/05
Today's focus: Have you gone to a hot spot today?

Dear networking.world@gmail.com,

In this issue:

* Hot spots on the rise
* Links related to Wireless Computing Devices
* Featured reader resource
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This newsletter is sponsored by Good Technology
Network World Executive Guide: Wireless Security. New Standards
make it easier than ever

As wireless LAN technology reaches the mainstream of enterprise
IT, security continues to be the top barrier to adoption. In
this report, we detail the possible approaches to wireless LAN
security and talk to experts who provide analysis and
recommendations on which ones to use. Register today and get a
free copy of Network World's Wireless Security Executive Guide.
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_______________________________________________________________

Today's focus: Have you gone to a hot spot today?

By Keith Shaw

T-Mobile HotSpot, the carrier's wireless LAN service division,
recently expanded its network through new roaming agreements to
provide access at more hotels, airports and other worldwide
locations.

In addition, the company released some usage statistics from its
customers: For example, T-Mobile says that customers are now
spending 64 minutes online per session, up from 45 minutes last
year. The company also said that more than 450,000 unique
customers have paid for T-Mobile HotSpot service in the past 90
days.

Joe Sims, vice president and general manager at T-Mobile
HotSpot, says the company moved more than 17.5T-bytes of data
across its WLAN hot spots in May 2005, compared with 10T-bytes
in December 2004. The company says the new roaming agreements
will allow users to access more than 9,800 new locations for a
total of 25,000 total locations across 17 countries.

In the meantime, JiWire, which provides a directory of global
hot spots, released its June 2005 report on the state of the hot
spot market. JiWire says the current number of hot spots in 99
countries is 64,799, compared with 36,000 in August 2004 (for a
cool hot spot finder, go to
<http://www.jiwire.com/search-hotspot-locations.htm> ).

The U.S. remains the king of the hot spot, with 26,331 hot spots
scattered across the nation, followed by the U.K. (9,689),
Germany (5,876), France (3,666) and Japan (2,626).
Interestingly, in Europe the hot spot phenomenon seems centered
around big cities - London has the most hot spots worldwide with
1,201, followed by Tokyo (1,035) and Paris (769). In the U.S.,
New York (529) leads Chicago (416) and San Francisco (395).

The most popular locations for Wi-Fi access remains at hotels
(18,067), with cafes (10,153) and store/shopping mall (7,105)
also providing popular Wi-Fi sites, according to JiWire.

Good luck trying to find a free Wi-Fi hot spot - you're more
likely to find a pay service - 59,087 are paid hot spots
compared with 5,712 free locations, according to figures from
JiWire.

So where do we stand with wireless hot spots? Have we moved into
the mainstream in terms of always-available wireless access?
These numbers, while impressive, likely only scratch the surface
in terms of where people can access the Internet through a WLAN
connection. The increased growth of the number of hot spots (we
regularly receive news of the latest resort, beach, laundromat,
etc. that has wireless access) is encouraging, and roaming
agreements with service providers mean that users won't have to
have five different accounts in order to access the network.

WiMAX and other broadband wireless deployments loom on the
horizon, meaning more metropolitan areas will soon be covered
with wireless availability (some free, most likely for pay). And
the wide-area carriers continue to provide wide-area wireless
data coverage through their networks (CDMA EV-DO, EDGE, etc.),
although the high pricing model seems to limit the uptick of
customers at the moment.

The overall big picture for wireless access looks very good - I
think the ultimate goal would be to enable users to access all
of these technologies - Wi-Fi, WiMAX and wide-area 3G services -
on a single device with software that can intelligently
determine the best network based on price, bandwidth or signal
strength. While I would like that now, it probably will take a
few more years to get the services all straightened out, as well
as the devices that can do this (laptop? PDA? Tablet? We're
still debating those issues).

For now, I'm happy to see that the gloom and doom about Wi-Fi
hot spots isn't as prevalent, and that users can still go on the
road and find some places with decent wireless Internet access.
_______________________________________________________________
To contact: Keith Shaw

Keith Shaw is Senior Editor, Product Testing, at Network World.
In addition, he writes the " Cool Tools
<http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/cooltools.html> "
column, which looks at gizmos, gadgets and other mobile
computing devices.

You can reach Keith at <mailto:kshaw@nww.com>.
_______________________________________________________________
This newsletter is sponsored by Good Technology
Network World Executive Guide: Wireless Security. New Standards
make it easier than ever

As wireless LAN technology reaches the mainstream of enterprise
IT, security continues to be the top barrier to adoption. In
this report, we detail the possible approaches to wireless LAN
security and talk to experts who provide analysis and
recommendations on which ones to use. Register today and get a
free copy of Network World's Wireless Security Executive Guide.
http://www.fattail.com/redir/redirect.asp?CID=107079
_______________________________________________________________
ARCHIVE LINKS

Archive of the Wireless Computing Devices newsletter:
http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/mobile/index.html

Keith Shaw's Cool Tools:
http://www.networkworld.com/columnists/cooltools.html
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